him and Mr Fleming were to be decided according to his
character, it would go hard with him, and for a moment it seemed as if
the sins of his youth were to be remembered against him, and that his
punishment was coming upon him after all those years. But he pulled
himself up when he got thus far, saying he was growing foolish and as
nervous as a woman, and then he rose and took his hat and went down to
the mill.

He met his father on the way, and the old man turned back with him down
the street again. There was always something the squire wanted to say
to his son about business, and Jacob owed more than he acknowledged--and
he acknowledged that he owed much--to the keen insight of his father.
He seemed to be able to see all sides of a matter at once, and though
Jacob liked to manage his affairs himself, and believed that he did so,
yet there had been occasions when a few words from his father had
modified his plans, and changed the character of important transactions
to his profit. At the first glimpse he got of him to-day, a great
longing came over him to tell him all his trouble and get the help of
his judgment and advice.

It was possibly only a passing feeling which he might have acted on in
any circumstances. But his father's first querulous words made it
evident that he could not act upon it to-day. It is doubtful whether
any of Jacob's friends or acquaintances, whether even his wife or his
sister, would have believed in the sudden, sharp pain that smote through
Jacob's heart at the moment. He himself half believed that it was
disappointment because he could not get the benefit of his father's
experience and counsel at this juncture of affairs, but it was more than
that. He really loved his father and honoured him. He had been proud
of his abilities and his success, and of the respect in which he was
held by the community, both as a man of business and as a man. He had
tried since his manhood to atone to him for the sins of his youth, and
had striven as far as he knew how to be a dutiful son, and on the whole
he had satisfied his father, though doubtless a son with a larger heart
and higher capabilities would have satisfied him better. But they loved
one another, and the squire respected his son in a way, and they had
been much more to each other than people generally, knowing the two men,
would have supposed possible.

When Jacob saw his father so feeble and broken that afternoon, and heard
his queru